Aircraft Carriers Air Force (RAF); recoilless guns; Red Army Air Force (VVS); Swordfish; United States Army Air Forces; VLR (Very Long Range) aircraft; Zerstoerer AIRCRAFT CARRIERS In 1914 the Royal Navy conducted the first ever aircraft carrier-launched air attack Escort carriers were also used to guard shipping routes during World War I At the Washington Naval Conference in 1922, the strategic importance of carriers was misunderstood by many involved Construction was limited in the final treaties mainly because it was feared that some navy might seek to convert such large-hulled ships into battleships, still thought to be the most powerful and decisive naval weapons platforms In fact, the United States and Japan later converted old battleships and battlecruisers —which also were limited by treaty in 1922—into carriers Germany and Italy remained solely reliant on battleships, battlecruisers, and heavy cruisers, and these were mainly confined to port during the war for fear of loss All major navies continued to overestimate the utility of battleships and to build more of them before and during the war Only the three largest navies—the American, British, and Japanese—came to see a vital future role for carriers during the interwar period, in long-distance reconnaissance and then as a strike weapon of great power The Royal Navy deployed the largest carrier fleet in Europe in 1939, but it had too few trained crew and no offensive carrier doctrine Its naval aircraft were also of poor relative quality As the true importance of aircraft carriers emerged through 1940, the British were compelled to convert cruisers, liners, and even a few large merchantmen into ersatz carriers These were used in convoy escort duty on an emergency basis in 1939–1940 These inadequate ships were later replaced by true escort carriers The Regia Marina, French Navy, and Kriegsmarine did not complete their carrier programs before the war They all laid the greatest shipbuilding emphasis on other types of capital warships The shared inclination away from deploying carriers in the Mediterranean arose partly from “gun club” conservatism, but more from a strategic judgment that in Europe’s confined spaces land-based bombers could be expected to operate at will That compared to ocean-spanning needs and outlooks of the USN and IJN, and to a lesser extent of the globe-spanning Royal Navy For instance, the Italians entirely relied on land-based torpedo and dive bombers They spent all naval appropriations on battleships and heavy cruisers and on smaller escort warships or attack craft They built no carriers, despite aspirations to dominate the Mediterranean The French enlisted just one converted carrier by 1939, with only one new fleet carrier under construction Interservice rivalry limited cooperation that might have led to France developing more sound naval aviation, but so did a primary consciousness that France was a land power and that it faced the gravest threat on the ground along the Rhine The Royal Navy therefore began the war with a substantial lead in naval aviation in Europe: it had seven carriers These were initially used—some historians say misused—in close anti-submarine warfare As a result, HMS Courageous was sunk by a U-boat on September 17, 1939, just two weeks into the critical Battle of the Atlantic (1939–1945) The RN deployed its carriers to deter or block a potential German invasion of Britain after June 1940 When that danger passed, some were employed to soundly 20